Most women I speak to take a dim view of senior women who distance themselves from groups, alliances or other opportunities to help women climb the ladder behind them. I experienced the rejection of one of those women mid-career and vowed never to be like her. I have spoken to countless female CEOs and directors who also condemn the actions of women who refuse to help other women.
But on the weekend I read an article in The Wall Street Journal about Indian businesswoman Ameera Shah that made me wonder if we haven’t been too fast to judge those women. Shah is the managing director and chief executive of Metropolis Healthcare Ltd. She explained that her gender is an issue while doing business at the top.
“People see me first as a woman and then as a business leader and that becomes an obstacle to them building a relationship,” she said.
When I read that quote I thought of the handful of successful women who have reputations for surrounding themselves with men in business. I started to wonder if these women were really just products of their circumstance. If the only way to get the job done at the top of your chosen industry is to become more like the men and virtually join the boy’s club while simultaneously rejecting women’s networks then perhaps their actions and attitudes are explainable. I will stop short of saying its excusable but the article did offer me a tiny glimpse into the challenges confronting the lone women at the top.
The thing is once we reach the point where female CEOs are as much the norm as male CEOs, life at the top won’t be as lonely for those women and they won’t be thought of as women first and business leaders second because their business networks will be gender balanced. It’s currently male networks that view these female leaders by their gender so if they thought about it they would see how important it is to achieve gender equality at every level of an organisation. And that means pulling the ladder down so that other talented women can join them and potentially replace them someday on the top rung.
Perhaps we should stop whispering about the female leaders who have turned their backs on the next generation of female leaders and start pointing out the obvious to them instead.
Do you agree it might be time to stop criticising ‘those’ women and start helping them to understand?